


in the spirit of giving

by catbrains



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Christmas Stockings, F/M, Gift Giving, angst but only lowkey, but they’re both trying their best, could easily be seen as platonic, izaya is lonely and doesn’t know how to express emotions, namie is cold and doesn’t know how to experience emotions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 12:46:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17142020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catbrains/pseuds/catbrains
Summary: Namie arrives to work to find a Christmas stocking on her desk, and a carefully distant Izaya at his own.(Written for the 25 Days of Durarara!! event on the Durarara!! Amino.)





	in the spirit of giving

**Author's Note:**

> (not beta read, please let me know if there are any mistakes!)
> 
> i swore to myself i’d never fall into these two, but...i love them...

Namie hadn’t been expecting anything when she walked into work that morning.   
There was no reason for it to be a day different to any other, aside from the chilled weather outside and the jovial red and green decorations that littered the windows of every store that framed her route to work, but those had been up since mid-November.  Christmas.   
A holiday that she still did not understand, and couldn’t help but scowl at the idea of as she watched loud children tell tales of Santa Claus that they’d learnt from those dreaded Americans, or those sappy young couples that walked around the tastefully decorated park’s hand-in-hand.   
  
There was no reason for it to be a holiday, and Izaya seemingly agreed, since he hadn’t offered her any more time off than usual.   
She’d insisted on taking a few days around the 25th in order to spend time with Seiji, but that was as much holiday cheer as the season seemed to be offering her.   
Until she walked into Izaya’s office, that is.   
  
It didn’t look at all different to the way it usually did.  The room was as devoid of decoration as always, thankfully, and Izaya himself was sat silently at his desk, feet up on the surface as he screwed around on his phone.   
Who knew if he was actually doing work or just messing around, but Namie didn’t care much.  Her attention was held entirely by the strange splash of colour on her desk.   
  
She removed her snow-damp pea coat and hung it up by the door, as well as her scarf, but brought her handbag to her desk with her as she usually did, her eyes never moving from the thing on her desk.   
Closer inspection revealed it to be cloth of some kind, but it was only when she picked it up that she truly realised what it was.   
  
A stocking.   
  
Not the usual kind, of course - a Christmas stocking, unshapely and gaudy and made of some sort of red silk, decorated at the rim with tasteful white fur and a few pretty little gemstones sewn over the surface.   
  
“What is this?”   
  
Her voice seems a little bit too loud in the silent office, like she’s disturbed a very gentle atmosphere, but Izaya doesn’t move at all.   
She glances to him, finally, and immediately noticed that - despite his relaxed position - he really doesn’t seem all that relaxed at all.  He’s stiff and unmoving, only staring at his phone screen, like he’s only playing the part of ‘relaxed’.   
Despite the fact that he doesn’t seem to be engaging with his phone at all, he doesn’t look up at Namie.   
“It’s a stocking,” he says, tone sharp.  “A Christmas tradition. Surely you know.”   
  
Namie hesitates somewhat.   
“I do.  They’re hung up by fireplaces and filled with small gifts.  I mean, why do I have one on my desk?”   
There is no response aside from the vague sound of a scoff, and Namie glances up from the stocking just in time to see Izaya stand suddenly from his desk and make his way with stiff strides to hide himself amongst his many bookshelves like a meek child.   
What is going on?   
  
Namie furrows her eyebrows, but Izaya seems to have no interest in engaging her further.  Finally, she looks to the stocking again and lifts it properly from the desk, planning to look over it for some kind of trick or crude joke that only Izaya would devote himself to so fully.  Only then does she notice that it’s particularly heavy, and very lumpy towards the bottom.   
It has something inside of it.   
Her interest - and confusion - piqued, Namie somewhat coldly upends it and sends its contents sliding out over the glossy surface of the desk, revealing that it did, in fact, hold several items - thankfully none of them all too fragile.   
  
She picks up the nearest one, a small rectangular box, and turns it over.  It’s a fountain pen, emerald green with elegant gold detailing and a dark red stone - a garnet? - embedded in the clip.  It’s resting in a bed of black silk, and all of these details are enough for her to reduce that it must have been expensive.   
However much it cost, it was worth it.  It’s beautiful.   
Suddenly, she vaguely remembers a somewhat recent conversation with Izaya.  In the middle of the workday, she had hissed and thrown her pen to the next.  When he had somewhat mockingly asked what was wrong, she had explained that her fountain pen - an old gift from her uncle - had finally broken completely, though she was more frustrated with the need to now use a biro than she was hurt by the loss of something sentimental.   
  
Shaking her head, she moved onto the next item.  It was a smaller box than the one containing the pen, this one made of wood, and she slides it open gently.   
She can’t help but let out a soft gasp at what’s inside.   
It’s a barrette clip, made of silver - or perhaps white gold.  It’s small and elegant, understated, but it’s not the guessed price of the item that has her hands trembling just a little bit.  It’s the tiny decoration on the clip - a small flower, made of gemstones.   
It’s an elegant replica of the clip she used to wear in her hair as a small child, the one she loved until she outgrew it and had to turn herself into something colder, something crueller.     
  
Just as suddenly as she remembered the pen, she remembered Izaya laughing gleefully as he showed her a photograph that he’d obtained from somewhere, somehow.  It was her as a child, smiling sweetly at the camera as she clung to her frowning brother’s side. The flower clip was shining in her hair, and she’d felt an odd pang of longing before she turned her face to a scowl directed at her boss, who was making one cruel comment or another.  He hadn’t even let her keep the photograph, and had insisted that he needed it for something important.   
Namie had hissed at him then, saying that he only wanted to deprive her of those happy memories of days long before she had the misfortune of meeting him, but she feels an emotion like guilt blooming in her chest as she moves onto the next item.   
  
An elegant silver photo frame, containing - of course - the photo of her and Seiji.   
Trembling and smiling ever so slightly, she can’t help but hold it to her chest, keeping it there even as she moves over the other items.   
There’s quite a few of them - an assortment of liquor truffles that she’d offhandedly mentioned liking, a gift card to the shop where she got her favourite pair of heels, a dainty pair of emerald earrings, an expensive dark red lipstick that she’d had her eye on for several months.   
Not only were they expensive gifts - most girls would have been delighted to receive even one of the many gifts from their husband or boyfriend, though Namie was loathe to make the comparison - they were all thoughtful, all indicative of attention paid to the recipient.   
All indicative of care.   
  
Strangely enough, as she looks over the gifts which she’s now carefully picked up and laid out neatly, Namie feels a deeply unfamiliar burning sensation behind her eyes.   
She isn’t sure what the emotion is that directly links to the sudden urge to cry - whether it’s guilt or sentimentality or something much...more.  But she doesn’t have any real chance to think about it, because when she looks up Izaya is gone.   
  
He must’ve left a while ago, because the apartment is silent and unmoving, like Izaya had never been there at all.   
Somehow, the thought of the young man leaving in a silent rush, embarrassed or overwhelmed or terrified, as Namie looked over the gifts he’d picked out for her made her heart ache more.  She wants to thank him, wants to see whatever expression he’d wear on his face if she did.   
Most of all, she wants to know what all of this means.   
  
Her answer seems to come, however, with something in the stocking that she didn’t notice at first.  It’s a small piece of expensive card, with Izaya’s elegant business letterhead across the top. It must’ve gotten stuck when she upended the stocking, but she carefully pulls it out now.   
  
On the card, in his perfect, just-barely-smeared handwriting:    
  
“Dear Namie,   
  
Thank you for all of your hard work.   
  
Izaya”   
  
The message is simple, the type of thing that would seem cold to anybody else, but Namie can feel the ache of loneliness beneath it.     
Wiping daintily at the smears of her eye makeup, she sets the card down decisively on the desk and picks up her handbag.   
  
Hopefully Izaya won’t mind her taking a few hours off.  She has some shopping of her own to do.   
And also a text to remember to send - to inform Izaya that she’ll be bringing home food for the two of them tonight.


End file.
